(AKA: Word of Mouth Advertising... on Steroids.)

People do say the darndest things.  But they only say them once.  Real People don't read corporate-approved copy.  They speak from the heart.   

The objective of any testimonial spot is to combine the rational message in your Brand Promise with the enthusiastic believability that comes only from Real People.

Here's a brief outline of how I make them.  (Click to The Radio Show for samples.)

(If you've tried testimonials before and were dissatisfied with the results, perhaps you or your agency followed these Seven Steps to Ruining a Testimonial.)

 

 

 

STEP ONE: SCREENING.

     To get great gush, you want to recruit customers who will TALK enthusiastically.  you don't want reticent Mumblers & Droners. 

     Not surprisingly, people who write a lot will also tend to talk a lot.  So check your mail for long-winded complimentary letters.  Or ask for them.  This fishing technique is worth doing just to maintain good customer relations.  

EMAIL RECRUITMENT 

     It takes about a month to recruit, record and edit testimonial spots. The first step is to send a few hundred recent or repeat customers an email (or letter): 

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Dear ____: 

A few weeks ago you bought a ______ from us. Would you be willing to tell us in your own words what you liked most about it and how it affected your life? We’re thinking about running some testimonial ads in the near future and would like to know how customers like you feel about our brand. Just click REPLY, jot down your thoughts, and click SEND. 

Thank you so much, 
Name

(If you don't want to give out your personal email address, set up a special account for replies.) 

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     You’ll get the best response from recent customers who feel strongly about your brand and who want to be in an ad. They will literally sit down at the computer and apply in writing for the job of selling you to the world. 

     The longer the reply, the better the gush.

     STEP TWO: THE INTERVIEW

     You'll need 20 to 25 people willing to be interviewed on the phone. (Don't expect people to drive to a recording studio.) In a second email, ask them to choose from a range of days and times during which they can spend 20 minutes or so on the phone.  Get their land lines.  Make a schedule.  Confirm their day and time. About 2/3 of the original list will actually participate. 

     I like to email them 10-15 questions I plan to ask.  They vary for each brand but they basically cover the gamut from "Tell us about yourself," to  "When did you try us first?" to "What have we done for you lately?"  Many people will write out formal answers in fairly stiff "professional" English. That's fine.  You want them prepared. 

Hire a studio that can feed one or two phone lines into the database of a good digital editing platform such as ProTools. Your engineer should hear you and your interviewee and be able to adjust levels on the fly to get the best sound from the customer track.  I usually sit in my office on a conference call with my studio.  After each interview my engineer edits out my tracks and emails me MP3s of the gush. 

    You can easily interview 10 to 15 people a day.   Schedule them on the half-hour hour and allow 20 to 30 minutes for each interview.  

    Begin each interview with a little "off the record" chit chat, then "roll tape" and launch into your questions.  Go through them as quickly as possible.  Take notes.  Jot down any good phrases or comments. Don't ask your questions in the same order they appear in your email.  Mix things up.  Keep the chat lively.

    Once you get to the end of the questions, ask your engineer to "shut off the tape."  MAKE SURE HE DOESN'T.

    Now that you're "off the air," and your respondents are no longer "acting," ask them to tell you a little more about anything that stood out.  Your best gush can come from people who the tape has stopped.

STEP THREE: PENCIL EDITS.

     Get a local court reporter to transcribe the verbatim comments of all your respondents.  Then build a spot as if you were writing copy.  Instead of individual words, though, you're writing with complete sentences, fragments, and some two or three word bursts.  Leave room for any announcer copy.  (I like to get people to voice the client's phone # and URL!)

1. My transcriptionist uses a word.doc template that puts a 

2. number at the beginning of each line.  When I go through 

3. the text, I'll see a story line, product description, and gushing

4. endorsement - BUT IN THE WRONG ORDER. Use a highlighter 

5. on the really good stuff.  Copy the best lines, including 

6. their numbers into separate ROUGH COPY files for each spot.

STEP FOUR: DIGITAL EDIT & MIX.

    Send your line-numbered master transcription and rough copy to your producer.  He can assemble a rough edit.  If it's 10 to 20 seconds too long, you'll have to spend an hour or two per spot sanding, tweaking, moving bits of gush around, and inserting any VO copy.  Don't get rid of all the "ums" and "ers" and flubs, though. Errors are Real.  Leave in a few chuckles. Cut a final :60 to :615, then digitally compress to :595.  The speed-up adds urgency. 

   Is a Voice-Over even necessary?  Recently I cut a 15-voice fusillade spot with a click-to CTA that was nothing but gush.   

LISTEN  (mp3 format)

STEP FIVE: TRAFFIC.

    I usually like to run two to four spots in rotation during a test or rollout flight.  If your media buy  delivers a frequency of 3, theoretically the average person will hear each spot once.  That's three different sets of customers extolling your brand in a week or less.  You can always go back to the original interviews for more spots.

"Gee, people must really like this stuff!"

Well, now you have the recipe.   

Go whip up your first Perfect Soufflé!

   
(407) 895 3092